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Help...QTI Line Following Program - Still not working — Parallax Forums

Help...QTI Line Following Program - Still not working

jonesm84jonesm84 Posts: 3
edited 2021-04-07 18:56 in Learn with BlocklyProp

My students are working their way through the IR Remote Control tutorial for the Activitybot 360. Two of my students can not get their remotes to work with the robots. I overlooked the code and it is correct. Are there any other troubleshooting ideas we can look at??

Comments

  • DaveJensonDaveJenson Posts: 375
    edited 2021-03-22 20:44

    @jonesm84 said:
    My students are working their way through the IR Remote Control tutorial for the Activitybot 360. Two of my students can not get their remotes to work with the robots. I overlooked the code and it is correct. Are there any other troubleshooting ideas we can look at??

    You are certain that the Hardware is connected correctly? Not off by one pin or any of that sort of problem?
    Can you send photos of the setup?

  • dgatelydgately Posts: 1,630
    edited 2021-03-23 00:34

    One test for infrared transceivers (IR LEDs) is to view the transceiver while it is in operation through the camera on your phone. They will (usually) show the infrared LED blinking, although your naked eye cannot see lit IR lLEDs... That way you will know if the signal is being transmitted, as a first step in debugging the problem... Excuse the out-of-focus image but as you can see the purple-ish dot is a lit up IR LED on a remote control. The only way I could see it was with my iPhone camera...

    dgately

  • Ken GraceyKen Gracey Posts: 7,392

    @jonesm84 said:
    My students are working their way through the IR Remote Control tutorial for the Activitybot 360. Two of my students can not get their remotes to work with the robots. I overlooked the code and it is correct. Are there any other troubleshooting ideas we can look at??

    With certainty, it's one of these issues:

    And finally, have the students with the "working" systems help those who are having trouble. The individual components certainly work, they just need to be made to work together.

    Ken Gracey

  • GenetixGenetix Posts: 1,754

    jonesm84,

    Stupid question but has anyone checked the batteries?

  • Ken GraceyKen Gracey Posts: 7,392

    @Genetix said:
    jonesm84,

    Stupid question but has anyone checked the batteries?

    Excellent point right here. Should see the red LED when a button is pressed. Robot side should have about 7.0V on the battery pack or higher.

    Wonder where our original poster has gone to? Thanks to all of the engineers for your continued support!

    Ken Gracey

  • jonesm84jonesm84 Posts: 3

    Thank you for all of your comments. We will continue trying to debug the issue. Attached is the error message one of the students continues to get. I have looked over his hardware. All looks good so far.

    Screen Shot 2021-03-25 at 2.01.48 PM.png
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  • Ken GraceyKen Gracey Posts: 7,392
    edited 2021-03-25 19:20

    @jonesm84 said:
    Thank you for all of your comments. We will continue trying to debug the issue. Attached is the error message one of the students continues to get. I have looked over his hardware. All looks good so far.

    This looks more like a BlocklyProp download problem than an issue with the code and circuit. I'll get some more eyes on it.

    Ken Gracey

  • Jim EwaldJim Ewald Posts: 733

    That screen shot looks like it is coming from the old BlocklyProp system. In that system, the RAM checksum error is happening after the download to the device is complete. We usually see this where there is a hardware issue on the device or, occasionally, a problem with the FTDI driver.

    Try swapping a working robot with the questionable one to see the problem follows the robot or the student's computer.

  • Cluso99Cluso99 Posts: 18,069
    edited 2021-04-01 21:11

    @jonesm84
    Just a tip when posting, use a title that explains your problem. Otherwise a lot of us just skip the posts. You can edit the title by editing your first post.

    I see your in good hands. Just remember, if you have a number of items in the mix, you can exchange one unit at a time on the working units until you find the culprit. Then you can chase down that problem much easier.
    So, It’s all a matter of breaking down the problem into large blocks, and trying to swap out the large blocks until you determine which block your problem is in. Then try and divide that block down, until ultimately you get to the smallest block where the problem lies.

  • jonesm84jonesm84 Posts: 3

    Has anyone seen this error message before? We are still unable to get this program up and running. The hardware and wiring looks correct to me. The code appears to be good. My students are giving up....but here is the most recent error we got....thank in advance for any advice.

    Screen Shot 2021-04-07 at 1.10.24 PM.png
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  • Ken GraceyKen Gracey Posts: 7,392

    @jonesm84 this is an opportunity to really carefully debug a problem. You should post the student's code as an SVG file or as a screen capture - anything so we can see what's going on. The errors sound like you have a case statement with multiple switch controls with the same function names, or something along these lines. See this https://learn.parallax.com/support/reference/propeller-blocklyprop-block-reference/control too.

    With code, I'm sure we can help out.

    Ken Gracey

  • Ken GraceyKen Gracey Posts: 7,392

    Also, I wrote a very easy-to-follow tutorial here https://learn.parallax.com/tutorials/robot/activitybot/qti-line-following-activitybot-blocklyprop

    Well, I hope it's easy to follow. The program is built in steps, with tested subsystems. Like @Cluso99 pointed out, above, go backwards and break it down into little pieces.

    If you have a document camera I can also join your class tomorrow and help the students sort it out via Zoom.

    Ken Gracey

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